St. Luke’s jumpstarts Brockport’s winter concert season with A Very Jazzy January
Vocalists, guitarist and pianist team up to offer jazz standards for a cold winter night
For the first time, two experienced jazz performers will team up at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in a concert to benefit the Brockport Food Shelf. Vocalist Ben Monacelli and guitarist and singer Rudy Dean, Jr. will collaborate with pianist Amanda von Rathonyi and others on Saturday, January 21, at 7 p.m. The concert is free and open to the public.
Audience members will enjoy jazz standards such as “When You’re Smiling,” “My Funny Valentine,” “Mack the Knife,” and “Send in the Clowns,” among other favorites.
A donation of a non-perishable food item for the Brockport Ecumenical Food Shelf is appreciated. Please note: the Food Shelf’s top three current needs are cereal, soup, and canned pasta.
Rudy Dean, Jr. is a solo guitar instrumentalist and vocalist specializing in vintage jazz. His full repertoire includes soft rock, country and bluegrass. A native of Manhattan, NY, he has lived and played in Florida, Arizona, California and Oregon. Rudy now resides in Brockport and has become a favorite regular performer at the Brockport Arts Festival.
Tenor Ben Monacelli studied with Dawn Pierce and Kim Nazarian at Ithaca College, graduating with a degree in vocal jazz studies in 2020. Since then, he has performed as a soloist with the Center Stage Pops Orchestra, Rochester chamber choir First Inversion, and the Brockport College-Community Chorus, directed by Elizabeth Banner. He is currently serving as a choral leader at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church.
“There’s a quality in Ben’s voice that goes straight to the heart. He makes us all vulnerable,” says St. Luke’s Music Director Brenda Tremblay. “Hearing Ben perform with an experienced jazz specialist like Rudy Dean will be very special.”
The concert will include a set of jazz standards sung by members of St. Luke’s Schola Cantorum, including Caitlin Glastonbury, Elizabeth Harden, and Jessica Moss, led by Brockport High School graduate Gavin Tremblay.
This concert is made possible through a grant from the Brockport Arts Fund of the Rochester Community Foundation.
St. Luke’s is located at 14 State Street, Brockport. St. Luke’s Main Street doors will open at 6:30 p.m.
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